Because I want to read almost every one of the books on this list -- "under the radar reads" by NPR.
Just read this quote from Last Night in Montreal.
The problem, Eli used to think before he met her, was that he'd never suffered except insofar as everyone does: the stalled trains, the alarm clocks that don't ring when they're supposed to, the agony of being surrounded by other people who all give the impression of being way more prolific and considerably more talented than you are, wet socks in the winter, being alone in any season, the chronic condition of being misunderstood, zippers that break at awkward moments, being unheard and then having to repeat yourself embarrassingly in front of girls you're trying to impress, trying to impress girls and failing, girls who can be seduced but remain unimpressible, girls who can't be seduced and/or turn out to have boyfriends in the morning, girls, being alone, paper grocery bags with falling — out bottoms, waiting in line at the post office for a half hour and then being snapped at because you don't have the right customs declaration forms to send the birthday gift to your perpetually traveling brother, waiting in line anywhere, phone calls from a disapproving mother who doesn't understand, the crowd of overeducated friends who understand too much and can't resist bringing up long — dead philosophers and/or quantum physics over an otherwise perfectly civilized morning coffee, girls, an overall lack of direction and meaning as evidenced in your inability to either finish the thesis, abandon the current thesis and write a different thesis altogether, finish the different thesis, or heroically give up the whole thing completely and go to work at a gas station somewhere upstate, stepping in things on the sidewalk, lost buttons, most kinds of rain, standing in line at the grocery store behind the lady who just knows there's a coupon in here somewhere, girls, and the sense that all of this adds up to a life that's ultimately pretty shallow and doesn't really mean that much, particularly in comparison to his older brother saving children in Africa.
I totally hate "standing in line at the grocery store behind the lady who knows there's a coupon in here somewhere". She is the bane of my existence, too.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
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